Lyrics Jocko and the Trapeze Lady - The Kingston Trio

Jocko and the Trapeze Lady

He was a boy when the circus first came to the dust of his West Texas town
And twenty years later, he’d spent twenty years as Jocko the Sad Circus Clown
He did slap-stick gags in grease paint and rags and the people would laugh 'til
they cried
But they never saw past the painted clown mask to the sad, empty man locked
inside
The trapeze lady swung easy and gracefully, high in the high trapeze swing
Her parents were flyers.
The circus was her life.
The carny was deep in her
veins
High in the spotlights in sequins and pink tights, she flew like a bird in the
wind
The saw dust’s on daughter, the strong men who caught her were all that she
brought to her tent
Jocko worked down with the center ring clowns with a sad painted smile on his
face
And the trapeze lady swung easy and gracefully high in the great canvas space
Jocko looked up with a tear in his heart and, Lord, he wished he could fly
For she never looked down at a baggy pants clown who looked up with love in his
eyes
It was Tulsa, the last stop, the last show of the big top, a loud,
sell-out crowd filled the seats
They clapped for the walk-around and cheered for the clowns.
The fliers brought
them to their feet
Then a still half-lit match fell in tender dry grass and soon found the dry saw
dust floor
The flames leaped higher.
When the people heard, «Fire!»
they swept like a wave
for the door
Jocko looked up to the top of the tent and a hundred feet from the ground
Swung the trapeze lady, up on the high swing, alone, with no way to get down
He ran to the ladder that led to the platform, she cried, «Jocko, no!
There’s no time!»
But her quick word of fear fell deaf on love’s ear as slowly he started to climb
Hand over hand to the high flier’s stand, taking the rope that hung there
With one quick look down, the sad circus clown looked up and took to the air
Slow then slowly he started to swing, his eyes turned to tears in the smoke
Faster then faster and as he swung past her, her strong flier hands found the
rope
She slipped to the ground as the flames found the rigging and licked at the
rope that he held
He’d started below when the rigging let go and down to the saw dust he fell
She ran to his side and with tears in her eyes, «Oh, no!
Jocko, why?»
she cried
He raised his sad head.
«I loved you,» he said and he closed his eyes and he
died
Now, the trapeze lady swings easy and gracefully high in the great canvass space
But a place and a time are still etched in her mind of a smile painted on a sad
face
And she sometimes looks down to the center ring clowns for someone she never
has found
For she still remembers the time when love came to her wearing the face of a
clown